Chapter 107 Call it a day
"The exam is still a few months away." Ji Feng kindly reminded.
"Do you want to be an examiner?" Qingye asked.
Hayate nodded.
Xuanjian looked at the position of the sun, made a face, and prepared himself, his fingers making a clicking sound.
"Let's go. I don't know about you three, but I don't want to be caught by a bunch of genin."
They caught him without him noticing. The ANBU Special Forces lost the war.
Kakashi looked down at Genma, who was lying on the grass with a frown on his face, his hand suspiciously covering his masked mouth.
Xuanjian gave him the middle finger.
"I hate you."
Kakashi smiled, a deep laugh coming from beneath his palm.
"I did tell you they could be a little stubborn."
"If stubbornness is some kind of code for the devil, then this disclaimer doesn't quite fit."
Kakashi laughed again, which was odd since he usually didn't really laugh more than twice a month.
"To be honest, I didn't expect them to drag the entire graduating class into this," he defended.
****
"Get it off, get it off, get it off now!" Anko screamed not far away, jumping up and down, waving her arms wildly, as if the seal on her skin would fly away if she shook it hard enough.
Kakashi raised an eyebrow at her.
"That's a seal, Anko. Not a spider."
"Get rid of it," she demanded fiercely. "I can't channel my chakra."
Aoba cursed from mid-air above a pine tree, he was obviously trapped by the shadow binding technique. Judging from the difficulty he had in coming down, he obviously had not yet broken free from the illusion.
"Left, Aoba. Left." Hayate commanded. "No, no, your left."
"Screw you, I'm gonna jump," Aoba declared, and before Hayate could stop him, he leaped, obviously aiming for the loudest thing he could use to determine direction, which in this case happened to be Anko.
They growled, wrestled, cursed, and hissed like cats.
Hayate sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose with the back of his thumb.
"We only need a few more tents to have a complete circus," Kakashi said slowly.
"Help me up, bastard," Xuanjian growled.
He was still breathless from Choji's swollen fist hitting his diaphragm, not to mention the dizziness from the Yamanaka family's Heart Turn Jutsu - he was sure they exchanged glances, because he didn't even think Ino could do that - and the soft fist of the Hyuga family when he was paying too much attention to the Inuzuka brat.
Kakashi kindly extended his hand and slowly pulled him up.
"It looks like you didn't catch anyone off guard," he commented nonchalantly.
"Well, I didn't expect a genin to use guerrilla tactics," he growled.
Kakashi patted his shoulder in a friendly manner.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s to never underestimate them.”
"Does anyone know where they went?" Aoba and Anko asked after they finally managed to free themselves from each other.
"Oh, shit."
Genma heard the sound of flints and the smell of smoke and turned to see Asuma standing at the edge of the clearing, lighting a cigarette.
Hong appeared not long after, hiding her hearty laughter behind her curled fingers.
"I think we created a monster."
Asuma rubbed the back of his head tiredly.
"They don't seem to need much encouragement."
Kakashi snorted, his eyes scanning the woods.
"Okay, you three, come out. Today's game is over."
"oops."
Kakashi's three students suddenly appeared in front of them out of nowhere, followed by Team 8 and Team 10.
Asuma looked thoughtfully up at the treetops from where the children had emerged, noticing a strange combination of illusions that had been hiding their tracks.
This was no ordinary illusion—Xuanjian would definitely notice the illusion.
Asuma's eyes immediately turned to Shikamaru, who had his hands in his baggy trouser pockets, his face bearing the indifferent, yet sharp, expression typical of the Nara clan.
"How long have you been hiding this trick?" he asked the student in his charge.
Shikamaru shrugged.
"Several weeks."
Asuma hummed in approval but said nothing more.
"Teacher Asuma! I learned the technique of Heart Turn!" Ino said as she skipped over to her teacher.
Asuma raised his eyebrows and said with a smile:
"Have you learned it?"
Then, the air was suddenly filled with the chattering sounds of twelve year olds, vying to tell their respective jonin sensei what they had learned, and Genma watched in fascination as the three naughty children who had always been giving him a headache were practically competing for Kakashi's attention.
Kakashi responded to them - he squatted down to listen to them, answered their questions, gave instructions when they demonstrated hand seals, offered suggestions when they talked about theories and ideas, and even reached out and gently corrected a jutsu in which Naruto had made a mistake in the order of hand seals.
To his right, Kurenai was ruffling Inuzuka Kiba's hair with her hands while praising Hinata's intelligence.
Then, as Shino began to speak calmly, she reached out and adjusted his hood, nodding affably as he described how he had used her teachings to disrupt Aoba's special perceptions with the Heart Transmigration Technique.
Asuma smiled as he listened to Choji's stories of his heroics against Genma and Anko, and rubbed Akimichi's head with his knuckles.
Ino was practically hanging on his arm, chattering non-stop in his ear, supplementing Choji's description and recounting her own experiences.
Shikamaru said nothing other than to clarify something, but when Asuma placed a hand on his shoulder, his stiff posture relaxed.
...Well, damn it. Xuanjian found that his gloomy mood disappeared unwillingly, and a helpless smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
Anko hummed behind him, leaning against him and pointing a finger at Naruto.
"you."
This kid is brave, Xuanjian had to admit, because he actually dared to blink and look around, as if implying, me?
Anko nearly jumped up in excitement, but Kakashi cut in before she could get too excited.
"She has a mission tomorrow, kid."
Naruto sighed dramatically, "Oh, alright."
He pushed past his teammates and walked in front of Anko and Genma, holding out his hand without fear, waiting expectantly.
Anko gave him a skeptical look but held out her arm anyway.
The boy made several seals, including one that Genma didn't recognize, and pressed two fingers onto the seal at the center of Anko's upper arm.
With a surge of white chakra and a sound similar to breaking glass, the seal disappeared directly from her skin.
Naruto finished his work and bounded back to his sensei, sitting next to his accomplice again, Sasuke making room for him without hesitation.
Kakashi smiled, stood up straight, and turned to the ANBU members who were getting up and gathering behind Genma.
"They certainly made your day a bit rough," he admitted. "How about we treat you to an early dinner as compensation?"
"Eat?" Qingye asked, his attention immediately drawn to him.
"Oh! We can make curry! Our curry is the best." Sakura said enthusiastically.
"I think we have enough space now," Sasuke said.
"Is everyone able to come?" Naruto asked Kakashi.
Kakashi tilted his head.
"Of course. This is as much my home as it is yours."
"I think I heard curry?" asked Choji.
